Different Paths
by VerelLupin
Summary: Based on The New World Movie. John Rolfe sees her but what if she had not been as alone as he thought. His thoughts on how that changes their relationship. Her thoughts on John Smith and Smith's thoughts on what she means to him.     John Smith/Pocahontas Pairing.
1. John Rolfe

**This is based of the New World movie and is just the ending I would have liked. I don't care if its not historical since neither was their romance. **

**I own nothing. **

**Enjoy...**

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><p>I observe her sitting quietly along the river.<p>

They say she is broken, that without Smith she cannot understand our ways.

I know they are wrong. She understands our ways too well and she thinks that the captain was what kept her welcome among us.

I begin with small gestures to befriend her. I show her she is not alone.

Eventually she will come to accept us, accept me. She dwells in the house he made but never finished. I convince her to come into the safety of the fort. She knows how bitter the winter can be and she does not have the benefit of her people.

The women begin to cautiously approach her and it is when she truly begins to trust me that I understand the depth of her anguish.

As the days turn into weeks it is clear that she is not completely alone.

Her swollen belly attests to what exactly the Captain left behind and she asks about our ceremonies and what binds a woman to a man. Her people have a similar idea but here in the English way she will be unprotected.

I offer her a solution but she will not marry me for her love and body were already committed to another. I persuade her to marry me as a proxy for Smith and she agrees to protect the innocent life of her child.

The men pitch in to create a home for her. Her devotion to learning our ways motivate them though she'd won them long ago on that frozen winter day when she kept them from starving.

The months pass and she is baptized as Rebecca Smith long before her son, Thomas, is born. The child looks like him and it is a comfort to her and a sad truth to me that she will forever be out of my reach.

A voyage to England is planned and though she wishes to see her dead husband's homeland, a strange foreboding comes over her and she decides to stay in her native land to await our return.

I watch from the docks as her figure and that of her son grow smaller as they wave and wish us a good and safe journey. I feel an ache at her absence but my path and hers is not entwined. I've come to accept it.

Smith is seen about town desperate to return to the new world. My soon to be bride, Mary, and I offer to pay for his voyage if he will accompany our tobacco plants.

He agrees and departs within the month but not before I tell him of the wife that waits but not of the child that bears his face as that is a secret that is not mine to tell and one that will unite him with a woman I still love more than I should.

I wish him happy and he offers his sincerest gratitude to me for not abandoning her like he had. He leaps onto the ship; a new man and I remark that I hope their reunion is swift and painless.

Mary says that love is never without pain and that is what makes it remarkable. I hug my sweet and I release my other love to the wind.


	2. Pocahontas

**I had to make her side of it and here it is. I do so love this couple and most of the Disney version.**

**Enjoy...  
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><p>I hear what they say.<p>

Hear them whispering about my sadness, about how he left me. I know they are wrong, he said he'd come back for me and I have no reason to doubt him.

But then I'm told of the fatal crossing. Of his departure from this world and time must move on. It's fingers trail over the cornfields and over the little house that is barely built. Like it, I am unfinished. A basic structure without the necessary walls to keep it protected.

Winter is coming and I cannot stay.

The other John watches me. He is kind but all I can do is compare. The brown hair that is not as dark as my John, the face that is softer. The arms that don't have the markings of my tribe and who's strength I don't want to know.

The one I barely acknowledge offers friendship. Offers to finish the house but I won't do this. It is the Captain's duty, I am his beloved and it reminds me that some things must be put to rest.

He offers me a permanent place but I thank him and he asks how long I will wait.

I reply that Smith was the only husband I will ever know or take, that I am already committed to him in this world and the next.

Time passes and again he tells me that I could start over but my rounded belly is just one of the many reasons to deny him. I am tied to the one presumed dead in all ways. He offers to marry me as proxy for my John and I accept. My child is innocent it must be protected.

The ceremony is small. I am both baptized and wed. My old life is shed like a deerskin and I emerge as one of them. Winter leaves and like spring I too bring new life.

A home must be built and the women in the small village take a shy interest in my child and like the man they offer friendship. It quiets the loneliness. They help with a new home but it is only a building. My only real hearth is still unfinished in the fields.

A boy is born and like his father, he wanders from my side. I take him to the river where I still privately mourn his father and to the abandoned little home. Among the tall grasses while my son explores I upturn my face to the sudden wind.

It caresses my skin and when the rain falls I imagine it is he showering me with his long ago kisses.

The other John must marry now and I bid him to be happy. He is leaving for his homeland to bring back a wife and I have promised to see him off. I had not been near the docks since my John left and he's been gone for three years.

My boy watches the ships with longing and I know I will loose him to the sea like his father before him. The water is peaceful as I look on but it is of no comfort for I have already paid the price once for believing in its calm nature and I ignore my son's cries at not being allowed closer.

The other John understand and kisses my hand in his genteel English way and holds Thomas up high in the air making sure the child squeals one last time to sooth the bitterness of not being near to the water that fascinates him so. Together we wave and offer a prayer of safe passage for the man that was a shelter for so long and the men that journey with him.

The seasons cycle one then twice. Thomas and I hear of the new arrivals and he can't help but want to greet the new people that represent the father he never knew.

Every ship brings pain but I go to watch them arrive. I will not fear the water anymore. I feel compassion for these pale and uncertain people thrown into a new land and I am happy to greet them and ushers them into their new world.

Thomas runs back and whispers excitedly that there is a new captain aboard the ship. That all the men are talking about the man that was thought dead long ago. His dark head bobs in excitement and he drags me with him to the docks.

A man descends from the ship and Thomas points towards him. I clutch his hand tightly nearly burying him in my skirts and his face looks up in confusion. I look down to reassure him but it is John's eyes that look back at me through our child and I am rendered mute.

He pulls from me and runs toward the stranger.

The boy speaks and the man responds and my heart constricts as their dark heads tilt identically and glisten in the sunlight while they study each other. I gather my skirts and approach him cautiously afraid he is a dream born out of longing.

He looks up and sees me.

His eyes… I had forgotten how deep and dark they are, how easy it is to fall into the depths of them and never come out. He is different from the John I knew. The restlessness is gone and in its place is a measured stance that promises stability.

He glances back at me and it is like the time never passed. We are both in the fields again young and in love and he is telling me he will come back for me. That he loves me as he has never loved another. I tell him that sleep will not come until he is by my side again.

Thomas calls for me and John looks down at the child again. I smile and he waits for the forgiveness and the permission to hold his own child. I nod and he drops his bag and lifts up the surprised child into the sky making him thrill in a way that I never dreamt would ever happen.

He puts Thomas down and runs to me. He has wings on his feet and the very wind lifts me up and into his arms and he unleashes a rainstorm of love upon me.

My son clings to my dress with a sudden protectiveness but John pays no mind and envelops us both. Thomas is happy to have met his father at last and he begs to be let go and he rushes off knowing I will be well protected from now on.

It doesn't take long to finish the house in the fields between us and when winter comes I lie beside him and he whispers that he'll never leave me again, that he was a fool to have ever gone.

I press our hands to my growing belly and he asks how I was so sure he'd be back when he wasn't. I say because he promised me long ago that he would return to me and I never doubted him.


	3. John Smith

**And now his side to round it out. **

**Enjoy...**

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><p>I shouldn't have lied to her. I shouldn't have loved her either but then I'd have no happy memories to ward of the regrets and I've always been a selfish man.<p>

I can admit that now. Now that I know what was dream and what was reality and how my thirst for adventure confused them in my mind.

I'm still in London. Still trying to get back to the new world. I see the man. He is named John Rolfe and the men around the docks speak of his familiarity with the Indian princess that saved Jamestown from starvation.

I want to hate the other man for having her time and possibly her love. I cannot hope to have a return of the feelings I willingly abandoned. A person cannot love a corpse and I've been dead to her and my heart for four years.

Rolfe overhears me ask for any work to pay for my passage and he waves me over. He proposes a job guarding his tobacco and I accept desperate to see that warm smile that I can no longer claim but long to view one more time.

I gather my things and in the morning as I climb up the gangplank he hands me a piece of parchment. I read my name next to someone named Rebecca and I look at him in confusion. A woman speaks up and that is when I notice the ring on her finger and the hold on Rolfe's arm.

He introduces her as Mary, his fiancée. I congratulate them and he nods with quiet gratitude. His fiancée casually mentions that the princess is now one of us with a new name.

He smiles tightly and I realize his sacrifice, one that continues even now. I thank him for being the man I was too self-centered to be and head to my spot by the rigging. I wave at the couple wishing them every joy.

The months at sea pass quickly and even the many chores aboard the vessel help mark the time. My nights are left contemplating the parchment that is wrinkled from repeated handling and which resides next to my heart during the daylight hours to keep me company.

The ships line up and before I can throw myself overboard in my eagerness to disembark I am given a sack of food and shoved forcibly down the gangplank with my parcel. I deposit it and drop off many more before I am finally allowed to retrieve my own satchel and disembark for good.

I am determined to find the wife I should have been present to marry but who has haunted my dreams since I left.

Standing at the shore's end is a boy no older than five and he eagerly asks if I am Captain Smith. I tell him I am and he runs off with the enthusiasm of the very young.

The boy returns not more than a few moments later dragging his poor mother behind him and I smile indulgently ready to be polite to the woman.

She is more beautiful than I remember and the boy's obvious charm is now understandable. I look to him then her and she nods in that silent but tender way of hers and I rush and pull her into my arms. I catch up my boy and kiss his ma and she blushingly explains who I am to the boy.

It takes a few months but he grows accustomed to his mother and me together and I bask in the glow of the love of a woman I don't deserve but that I was lucky enough to have wait for me.

I tell both I will never leave them and she tells me she knows and that she never doubted me. In a few months time I will hold my second child and I will thank the great mother for the gift given to me.


End file.
